Wynne

Wynne is located approximately 100 miles northeast of Little Rock and 40 miles west of West Memphis. Located along Crowley’s Ridge, Wynne was named after Captain Jesse Wynne, a prominent resident of nearby Forrest City. Wynne was incorporated in 1888. In 1882, the St. Louis, Iron Mountain and Southern Railroad began laying railroad tracks near the area that would become Wynne. When the railroad project was completed in 1888, Wynne became a stop along the route from Bald Knob to Memphis. The town began growing and, by 1903, the county seat moved to Wynne.

The community was still a railroad town in April 1927 when the disastrous Flood of 1927 decimated parts of the Arkansas Delta. The city’s railroad was used to transport flood victims to higher locations and many flood victims were relocated to Wynne.

The town’s post office is home to one of the 21 post office murals created in Arkansas as part of the New Deal, one of the many projects created in an effort to provide jobs to the unemployed during the Great Depression.

By the mid 1960s, the use of railroads declined. Factories began to build in the city and agriculture continued to be a large part of the city’s economy.

In 1975, Village Creek State Park was opened near Wynne along Crowley’s Ridge. The park, the second largest in the Arkansas State Parks system, encompasses approximately 7,000 picturesque acres along the Ridge. The park offers camping, hiking, two lakes (Lake Dunn and Lake Austell) and horseback riding. Village Creek State Park is home to one of the premier horse camps in the region featuring stables with water and electrical hookups and ceiling fans.